Nikolai Gogol

I am fated to journey hand in hand with my strange heroes and to survey the surging immensity of life, to survey it through the laughter that all can see and through the tears unseen and unknown by anyone.

Contents

I am very fond of the modest manner of life of those solitary owners of remote villages, who in Little Russia are commonly called "old-fashioned," who are like tumbledown picturesque little houses, delightful in their simplicity and complete unlikeness to the new smooth buildings whose walls have not yet been discolored by the rain, whose roofs are not yet covered with green lichen, and whose porch does not display its bricks through the peeling stucco.

"Old World Landowners" (1835)

"Turn around, son! What a funny figure you are! Are those priests' cassocks you are wearing? And do they all go about like that at the academy?" With these words old Bulba greeted his two sons who had been studying at the Kiev college and had come home to their father.

"Taras Bulba" (1835)

And ruined is the Cossack! He is lost for all the chivalry of the Cossacks! He will see Zaporozhye no more; nor his father's farms, nor the church of God. Ukraine will see no more the bravest of the sons who undertook to defend her. Old Taras will tear the gray hair from his head and curse the day and hour when he begot such a son to shame him.

"Taras Bulba" (1835)

When the priest went in, he stopped short at the sight of this defamation of God's holy place, and dared not serve the requiem on such a spot. And so the church was left forever, with monsters stuck in the doors and windows, was overgrown with forest trees, roots, rough grass and wild thorns, and no one can now find the way to it.

"Viy" (1835)

In the course of reading he became more and more melancholy and finally became completely gloomy. When the reading was over he uttered in a voice full of sorrow: "Goodness, how sad is our Russia!"

What is amusing will turn into being gloomy, if you stand too long before it, and then God knows what ideas may not stray into the mind...

The gentleman lolling back in the chaise was neither dashingly handsome nor yet unbearably ugly, neither too stout nor yet too thin; it could not be claimed he was old but he was no stripling, either. His arrival in the town created no stir and was not marked by anything out of the ordinary.

Chapter I

As it is so strangely ordained in this world, what is amusing will turn into being gloomy, if you stand too long before it, and then God knows what ideas may not stray into the mind... Why is it that even in moments of unthinking, careless gaiety a different and strange mood comes upon one?

Vol. I, ch. 3

There are people who exist in this world not like entities but like the speckles or spots on something.

Vol. I, ch. 5

And for a long time yet, led by some wondrous power, I am fated to journey hand in hand with my strange heroes and to survey the surging immensity of life, to survey it through the laughter that all can see and through the tears unseen and unknown by anyone.

Vol. I, ch. 7

Since you are without end yourself, is it not within you that a boundless thought will be born?

Oh troika, winged troika, tell me who invented you? Surely, nowhere but among a nimble nation could you have been born in a country which has taken itself in earnest and has evenly spread far and wide over half of the globe, so that once you start counting the milestones you may count on till a speckled haze dances before your eyes... Rus, are you not similar in your headlong motion to one of those nimble troikas that none can overtake? The flying road turns into smoke under you, bridges thunder and pass, all fall back and is left behind!... And what does this awesome motion mean? What is the passing strange steeds! Has the whirlwind a home in your manes?... Rus, whither are you speeding to? Answer me. No answer. The middle bell trills out in a dream its liquid soliloquy; the roaring air is torn to pieces and becomes wind; all things on earth fly by and other nations and states gaze askance as they step aside and give her the right of way.

Vol. I, ch. 11

Rus! Rus! I see you, from my lovely enchanted remoteness I see you: a country of dinginess, and bleakness and dispersal; no arrogant wonders of nature crowned by the arrogant wonders of art appear within you to delight or terrify the eyes... So what is the incomprehensible secret force driving me towards you? Why do I constantly hear the echo of your mournful song as it is carried from the sea through your entire expanse?... And since you are without end yourself, is it not within you that a boundless thought will be born?

Vol. II, ch. 2

Why are you being so stingy?", Sobakevich demanded. "It's cheap at the price. A rogue would cheat you, sell you some worthless rubbish instead of souls, but mine are as juicy as ripe nuts, all picked—they are all either craftsmen or sturdy peasants.

there is no word so perk and quick, which bursts from the heart with such spontaneity, which seethes and bubbles with such vitality, as the aptly spoken Russian word

Chapter V

The reason why Proshka wore such large boots can be explained at once: Plyushkin kept only one pair of boots for all of his servants, however numerous they were, and they always stood in the hall.

Chapter VI

They insist that an author should write in the strictest, purest and noblest language: in short, they expect the Russian language to drop from the clouds, already refined, and that it should come naturally to the lips, so that all they have to do is to open their mouth and stick out their tongue. It goes without saying, of course, that the feminine half of the human species is very wise; but it must be confessed that our respected readers are even wiser.

Apparently that does sometimes happen. Apparently even men like Chichikov are transformed into poets for a few moments in their lives: though the word "poet" would be an exaggeration here.

Chapter VIII

Among a number of intelligent suggestions there was finally this one too, strange as it may seem, that Chichikov might be Napoleon in disguise...

Chapter X

However, nothing turned out as Tchitchikoff had intended.

Russia! Russia! I see you now, from my wondrous, beautiful past I behold you! How wretched, dispersed, and uncomfortable everything is about you...